Will 'Captain America 2' begin production this year?

We all knew that Marvel was planning a sequel to the summer 2011 hit "Captain America," but we weren't quite sure when they were planning to do it, what with "The Avengers" coming up in May, and "Thor 2" finally smoothing out some pre-production problems.

According to "Justified" co-star Neal McDonough, who played "Dum Dum" Dugan in the first "Captain America," the studio is ready to go, and production on part 2 may start as early as the end of this year.

The Howling Commando told IMDBtelevision, "they’re planning for the end of this year, because Marvel does one film at a time. So they’re going to do "Thor 2" and as soon as "Thor" has wrapped, they’ll do "Cap 2." Hopefully right after that, we’ll jump into "Nick Fury" because that’s the one I’m looking forward to more than anything."

So Dum Dum will appear in the "Nick Fury" movie? McDonough goes on to say that he hopes it be set in the 1970s, because he wants "to see Sam Jackson with lambchops kicking people’s asses for Marvel universe." Hey, so do we!

Meanwhile, "Captain America" ended with Cap (Chris Evans) waking up in the present day, where Fury recruits him to be a part of The Avengers initiative. According to recent Joss Whedon talk, "The Avengers" will be told from Cap's perspective, so the solo sequel will likely tie directly into "The Avengers."